Electric Things
by telekineticBURN
Summary: Everyone has a past. It’s our futures that set us apart. [[ Sarkney - Spoiler s4.09 "A Man Of His Word" ]]
1. Silhouettes

**Electric Things**

Author : telekineticburn  
Rating : R (graphic violence, language)  
Spoilers : 4.08 "Echoes"  
Summary : Everyone has a past. It's our futures that set us apart.

**Takes place after the events of S4.09 "A Man Of His Word". **

**1. Silhouettes****  
****-**

The catalyst? No. Just a bystander, chosen from a fluid crowd, loved best because she hurt him least.

He took her to a ballgame.

A week gone and Sydney still had trouble grasping the outcome. Dazedly she watched the players take batting practice (or listened, blind, the melodic popping of the leather ball snapping from the bat) and eventually wandered to her seat, premium tickets along the left infield. He joined her finally in the 2nd, as the newest overpriced Met player stepped up to strike out.

Almost immediately she caught a foul ball.

"You're sainted," Sark commented, laughing.

"Canonized? Hardly," she said. "I've been carrying The Black Spot since college."

"Curses, Sydney? Leave that to the ballplayers," he scolded.

Another scoreless inning passed. Sark made no move to converse, idly draping his arm around her shoulders.

She looked him in the eye. "How, Sark?" she asked finally.

He grinned. "Magic."

-

She was notified early, soon enough to prepare. Sydney chose not to attend the hearing, not to listen to the conditions, not to watch him sign the dotted line. No less than twelve consecutive life sentences and Sark was released in just less than three years. For a while then she chose not to ask why.

From all Jack could tell, it was legitimate. The order came from above, the deific politicians in their tepid smoke-filled chambers, nameless by design.

A parole officer and 24-hour surveilance and My god, she thought, they've set him free.

The note came with a vase of velvet-colored roses. She told Nadia they were from Vaughn, with the same giddy expression that she hadn't intended, and pocketed the hand-written note.

It was naturally pretentious, honest and arrogant:

"_It's destiny, Sydney. You have my word._"

The card didn't require a signature. Tucked inside the envelope was a ticket to the Shea Stadium.

Against her head she told no one. After four weeks of being the A.P.O. agent on call, she requested a 3-day sabbatical that was granted without criticism. She bought a plane ticket and packed a single bag.

-

"I'm dead serious, Sark. You should be somebody's favorite jailhouse currency right now, not a free man taking in a ballgame."

He tipped his sallow-skinned face to the sun, eyes closed. "There's a signature on the release agreement, love. Try reading it."

"Not likely. Those files are classified higher than a headbanger on payday," she quarreled.

"I was a snitch for the warden. They let me out for good behavior."

"I'm done here."

Reflexes unhindered by jailtime; He blocked her from rising with an arm across her chest.

"It's a secret, Sydney," he murmured. "Don't make me lie to you. Let it be."

She met his eyes, blue ice incapable of warmth after decades in the shade. "What do you want?"

Sark smiled, a quiet grin unlike anything she'd ever seen. He shrugged. "A memory."

She refused to prompt him. He pretended to watch a ball soar foul into the grandstands, almost exciting but flatly dull as she sat beside him, a wisp of a life he'd taken a pass on.

"Tomorrow I'm leaving," he said. "Disappearing. I told you I've done with my evil ways, Sydney, and you may take it at face value. I can't believe my parole officer will much like it, but I haven't time to finish my rehabilitation their way." He laughed. "Please don't tell anyone I'm meditating breaking curfew. They'll throw me in the brig all over again."

Sydney, forgive her, was incredulous. "You're leaving? As in, vacation time? Brief sabbatical? Religious pilgramage? Details, Sark, details."

"Could you love me?"

That, yes, caught her off guard. Her mind went blank, words failed. _Does Not Compute_. "What? No."

"I'm not saying _do_ you, I'm asking _could_ you?" he clarified, jarringly calm.

Righteous anger rose, something she was good at. "You murdered Francie," she hissed.

"Yes, I did," he replied shortly. "I've done many damnable things. I've even tried to murder you on several occasions."

"_'Could I'_ -"

"Don't be repetetive. We know what the question is," he chided. "It's a legitimate inquiry. Present relationships out of the equation, could you love the man I'm attempting to become?"

Wordless and baffled, Sydney stared at him.

"Take your time," he said easily, turning his attention to the game.

She kicked him, hard, in the shin. "I hate you," she said. "I hate the man you were, and maybe still are. I hate the things you did, and what you're still capable of."

He grimaced. "That's fair, I suppose."

"It's an arbitrary question, Sark." She shook her head, at a loss. "I've never met the man you're asking me to love."

"That's why I asked you here today."

The seventh-inning stretch was announced. He bought her a massively overpriced and oversized hotdog.

"What are you doing, Sark?" she asked quietly.

Again, he shrugged. Never had she seen him so at ease. "Romancing you," he said. "Should that fail, watching a baseball game."

"I'm taken."

"Really? How archaic."

They listened in silence to the buzzing chatter of the packed stadium.


	2. Aces and 8s

**2. Aces and 8s****  
**-

At first he had said the words in his head, repeat, repeat, like a mantra for the corrupt : "_Let me out. Let me out. Let me out._"

Locked alone, seamless metal walls, handcuffed at all times, trays of bitter food twice a day brought in by pitiless prison guards in the highest security vault in the land. Sark was not housed with other prisoners : artifacts, evidence, and a graveyard in the basement, here they hid their darkest keepsakes.

The first visit from Michael Vaughn was mildly amusing and nothing more; A verbal battle that barely cleared the rust from Sark's throat. He saw the deceit instantly, and let it play out for the slight diversion of mocking Sydney Bristow's precious soulmate.

Sark had never any hope of being freed from the cage he'd earned. The necessity of his assisstance in capturing Anna Espinosa, galling to his former adversaries and harrowing to himself, had presented a chance to offer amends for the unanswered tragedies he'd inflicted so heartlessly. But it was clumsy, and misunderstood, and it fell flat.

Sark had made a promise to Sydney and he'd kept it, unconvinced though she'd been. He delivered her Espinosa and returned to his 10-by-20 foot corner of the world, where he fell silent and prayed amends to a god he believed in and despised.

So he listened to the echoes and waited for death.

Julian Sark had seen more of this life than any man should; The human soul is a flimsy, despicable thing, and his had become burnt sometime between the begging and the bloodshed.

A month to the day after the showdown in Venice, a month of shrieking silence alone with his ghosts, the door of Sark's cell slid open with a hiss. The guard unlocked his handcuffs and threw a bag stuffed with civillian clothes onto the cement floor.

"Your hearing is today," the man told him.

Confusing, and, worse, unexpected.

The security was surprisingly lax. They transported him to a common courthouse, empty save for a judge and an assistant district attornety. Smiling over the proceedings from the very back of the chamber had sat Arvin Sloane.

They told Sark to sign the dotted line and he did. Sloane slid out the back before he could demand answers.

A parole officer and community service. Sark stepped into the sunlight on the first day of his cheated freedom and could not fathom why he still drew breath.

He craved something stable, unchanging. A link to his past that didn't scald.

-

"Half-baked, presumptuous man-whore," she muttered under her breath.

Sydney stood indecisively eyeing the sliding glass doors. Over the loudspeaker her flight number was announced, urging travellers to proceed to terminal 4.

With a defeated growl she ripped her ticket in half.

"Cryptic, obtuse, British bastard," Sydney continued, winding her way toward the car rental.

She drew out her cellphone, entering a quick code to enter its rewired features index. Sighing, she tapped out a second code. The tracer she'd placed on Sark's collar immediately began transmitting, emitting a faint red light on the miniature map of Queens displayed on the screen. He was mobile, moving fast, east on the Long Island Expressway.

"Irritating, ostentatious, Freudian whack-job," she finished, jamming the keys of the rented Honda into the ignition.

Sydney needed answers, discontent to let him simply drift back into obscurity after today. He should have known this but ignored the possibility.

He would later, of course, take full credit for planning it.

-

Grotesquely, because she was declared to be She of Immovable Morals, Sydney had almost forgotten how to be honest. Here, motiveless beyond her curiosity, stripped of gadgets and disguises and protocols, she really hadn't the faintest idea of how to proceed.

Fess up, she supposed.

"Excuse me," she adressed to the front desk clerk, a small, smiling woman who looked about ready to force-feed a tourism guide to the next businessman who walked through the door. "I'm looking for someone. He probably just arrived. Last name Sark."

"We usually don't give out guests room numbers," the clerk explained, then grinned. "Boyfriend?"

Sydney laughed, and shook her head. "Boytoy."

After tapping out his name into her computer, the clerk directed her to the 5th floor. "Have fun, honey," she called after Sydney.

Remormed or no, Sark had yet to shed his predilection for refinery. After slipping past the eyes of his parole officer (a feat of effortlessness bordering on absence) he had holed up in the finest hotel on the shore of Parsons Beach, a mamoth highrise of frippery overlooking Little Neck Bay. He'd been there over a week, first debating over, than waiting for, Sydney's arrival.

She stepped off the elevator into a lush, silent hallway. Emptiness and cool air greeted as the metal doors slid shut behind her and descended.

Sark's room, #547, was located at the end of the hall. Sighing heavily at the sudden absurdity of tracking him here - he was, atrociously, a free man now - Sydney trekked slowly toward the door. Inanely, she wished she had changed first, out of the pheasant skirt and flip-flops she'd worn to the ballgame, into something dark and domineering and, perhaps, Kevlar.

She was lifting her hand to knock on his door when a gunshot (a 40. caliber automatic, certainly, an S&W 410, possibly 430) sounded from within.

Momentarily Sydney froze, objectifying her choices. There were many possibilities, none of them good. She aimed for the hinges and kicked the door down.

Her intentions for coming to New York had not involved heroism for the benefit of a converted assassin. Nonetheless, the amateur phyciatrist himself stood awkwardly with his head held flat against a table and a gun pressed below his ear.

There were four intruders in Sark's hotel room, discounting Sydney, who at the moment was rather welcomed. Four hulking men dressed in black, ski masks secure, one of them lying dead in the suite's kitchenette with a bullet in his esophagus. There'd been a scuffle, a straight-up, thrown-down fight, with broken furniture and battered bones, which Sark had recently lost. Two held him against a writing desk while the third prepared to perform the execution.

Sydney and the three living attackers stared nonplussed at eachother. Sark smiled around bloody teeth. "Sydney!" he said politely. "How wonderful to see you."

She dove to the floor. Bullets, bullets everywhere, but not a dead agent. Three goons with three guns, each with 10-round magazines, all fired at Sydney's head as she scrambled behind the recently-upholstered couch. One remained to restrain Sark as the other two moved in on her.

Stupidity (or trust, either option sickening) had moved her to not bring a gun. Weaponless, Sydney fell flat on her back as bullets lacerated the wooden coffee table inches from her head. Impatient, one attacker lept over the couch, landing precariously on the cushions.

Sydney lashed out, catching both feet in his stomach and using his momentum to launch him head-first into the television screen facing the couch.

"Freeze!" shouted the second assailant, aiming his Smith & Wesson at Sydney's forehead.

Brazen, she pushed off the ground with her hands, sommersaulting backwards to catch a dazing blow to his jaw as she flipped to her feet. Dodging the bullet that sliced past her ribcage, Sydney danced forward, catching his upraised arm and elbowing him viciously in the collarbone and sternum. As he doubled over she planted a quick left hook to the face, nose shattering as he fell pathetically to the elegant carpet.

Belatedly, Sark broke free from the grapple, twisting around to seize his captor's forearm, snapping it cleanly as he jerked the man sideways. Snatching the gun from his attacker's ruined hand, Sark plugged the last remaining bullet behind his ear. Blood and cartilege spattered Sark's face as the man fell limp in his grasp.

He glanced Sydney's way, to where she stood breathlessly amid two whimpering, concussed opponents.

"Oh, shit," he muttered. "I forgot about the No Killing rule."

Repelled, Sydney ran a hand across her mouth, struggling for composure. She took in the carnage, critical, unsure if she'd just saved a life or cost thousands.

"Your timing," he said, "is impeccable."

She gestured with disgust to the four dispatched assassins cluttering the ornate suite. "Welcome Home Party?" she guessed scathingly.

"More of a Get Well Soon or Else sort of thing," Sark answered, grimacing as he touched the gash running from his ear to his mouth. "I left some… business, unfinished when I went away. Their way of saying they want their deposit back in the form of a pound of flesh."

Sydney smiled darkly. "Who's 'they'?"

"Employers. Associates. I was a popular man in my time," he said caustically, blinking slowly to clear away the recent head trauma. "May I ask what brought you here?"

"Specifically? A tracking device. Honestly? Intrigue." Sydney, immersed in a surreal feeling of ease, sat gingerly on the bullet-ravaged sofa.

"I got to you, did I?" he smirked, rolling his stiff shoulders awkwardly.

She smiled, and was silent.

Through the open door, faint, came the cheerful _ding _of the elevator opening. Simultaneously, a cellphone began ringing from inside the pocket of an unconscious assassin and went unanswered. Footsteps advanced slowly from down the hall.

Sark fixed her with an apprehensive stare. "I have to run."

She stood.

"Do you honestly want to make amends for your past?" she asked.

"More than anything."

She'd never seen him like this, so haggard, haunted. The intensity of his stare gnawed through her skin and into her veins, infecting like poison.

"Then you'll need help," she said. "A lot of it."

Sydney darted forward, seizing him by the wrist and pulling him into the suite's bedroom. She slammed the door just as the reinforcements arrived, shooting erratically as the two disappeared from view.

"Dresser," she commanded as she moved swiftly to the window.

Compliantly he shoved the cedar dresser sideways, haphazardly blocking the door.

When it would not open, Sydney grabbed a lamp and threw it viciously through the window. Glass spiderwebbed and shattered, sparkling through the air as it fluttered into the bay.

She scrambled out onto the narrow ledge, catching her breath as Sark followed.

"Where are we - oh. Lovely," he lamented, staring down.

Sydney took his hand, sarcastic. "Ready to take the plunge?"

They jumped quixotically into the unclean waters of Little Neck Bay.


	3. A Day in the Life

**A/N :** Don't get spoiled, OK? I'm only updating this fast because I had three chapters written before I posted. Study-intensive college will be keeping me busy for a few days, so don't expect too much – I don't handle pressure well. I just wanted to say oodles of thanks to those who reviewed, especially the beloved faithfuls who stayed with me through "Two Years Lost". You guys mean everything to me!  
Cheers,  
Renny

(Sidenote : Annie, you know I love you, but I couldn't possibly have them at Yankee Stadium instead of Shea. I'm a die-hard Red Sox fan!)

**3. A Day in the Life...  
-**

"I've been chased through a drainage system in Somalia that was cleaner than this."

Sydney glanced up from the ground, glaring critically at him as she retched tainted lakewater. "Your fault," she rasped, and flopped wearily onto her back in the sparse grass.

They had just dragged themselves in from Little Neck Bay, aching and exhausted. They'd swam from Parsons Beach to the shore of Long Island under the heavy shade of midnight, in harsh water and cold temperatures.

Sark closed his eyes, gasping for air on his hands and knees. "Next time, I'd prefer the bullet in my lung to swimming across a New York bay."

They lay on a depleted shore, a beach of dirt and grass, the bay kept back by a wall of crumbling underwater granite that they'd clawed their way up in a daze. The air was full of noise, screeching tires and honking horns, the buzz of the Cross Island Parkway twenty yards away.

Sydney took aim and punched him in the jaw.

He yelled in surprised pain, reeling back and falling clumsily on his back. Sydney was up in an instant, straddling his chest as she seized his collar and lifted her fist.

"What did you _do_?" she shouted.

Impudently, he spit blood. "The caveman approach is one thing, love, but take it easy," he rebuked.

"My patience washed away in the water, Sark. What did you do?" she snarled. "What murder, what theft? Jesus _Christ_, Julian, it's only been a week! How could you _possibly_ have someone trying to kill you already!"

"Obtuse, Sydney - I already told you. I was under contract when I was sent to jail. These things don't just go away when you spend a few years in the cooler."

"When?" she demanded.

"Clarify, love," he noted, quarrelsome.

"The contract - when did you agree to it? Before we captured you in Stockholm, or before we re-captured you in L.A.? Clarify, jackass."

"Before Stockholm. I was hired... I was hired to kill someone. When the Covenant sprung me, my employer insructed me to put off the assassination until further notice. I didn't have time to ask, Sydney, and back then I didn't care."

Who was your employer?" she demanded predictably.

He didn't answer, staring up at her with the stagnate expression of a man facing a firing squad.

"Who?"

Sark reached up, slowly, and tucked a wet coil of hair behind her ear. "Arvin Sloane," he said.

A low growl escaped Sydney's throat. One of these days, she thought, it'd be a different mastermind. The statistics demanded it.

Disgusted, Sydney stood, pacing away from Sark as he rose stiffly. Impatient, he grabbed her by the arm.

"Sloane paid me to do a job and I won't do it. I _won't_, Sydney," he said, feverish. "That's why he had me released, but I'm not a murderer anymore. He can execute me, punish me, lock me in a cage miles from the light of day, but I refuse be what I was."

She bit her lip, conflicted. Sympathy and derision, skepticism of his achievement of serenity and hope for it, rose equally in her heart. "C'mon," she said simply. "There's a CIA safehouse nearby. I'm taking you back to L.A.."

She turned to go, but there was nothing doing. Sark seized hold of her, his grip tightening to a vice as he pulled her against him, inches away.

Sydney didn't bother to protest. He'd have his dramatic declaration with or without her permission.

"I'm not going back there," he insisted, his breath hot against her cheek. "I'm done with those people - the glaring and the ghosts. I'm done messing with your lackeys."

Suddenly, quicksilver, she ran her fingers through his salient blond hair, sending droplets of water exploding into the air.

"You can't run forever, Julian," she whispered. "Not from your enemies, and not from your past."

He locked eyes with her.

"And get your hands off of me, Mr. Inappropriate," she added cavalierly.

Sark sneered. "Lord, Sydney. You spent, what, two seconds on that insult?"

"Hands!"

He clearly had no intentions of removing his arms from around her waist. Conversely, he moved closer.

There was no need for this, none beyond the wretched ache he'd felt for her since the very beginning. It was ultimately, of course, _The Plan_ – capitalized, italicized, a destiny he'd been sure of since day one – but this was foolish, and he was playing the cards too soon.

She didn't resist - he would defy her to - as he touched his lips to hers, a ghost of a kiss. He held there, breath uneven, eyes closed. He craved to move further (unleash, unlock, make her see, make her feel) but resisted, basking in the fragile peace of the moment.

"Strategic much?" Sydney said, and laughed.

Sark recoiled like he'd been burned, his brain forcefully catching up to his body as she snickered.

"What was that, Sark? The Sensitive Spy? The Killer who Cares?" She put the back of her hand to her forehead, pretending to faint. "_'He kissed her with the tender hesitation of a man starving for love'_. That wasn't making a move, Jules, that was a romance novel!"

Disconcerted, Sark adjusted his sopping silk tie. He watched her sullenly as she doubled over giggling.

"I'm sorry, it's just – who would've thought you'd see the light and then go Merchant Ivory on me?" she burst, holding her breath against convulsions of amusement.

"Hilarious, Sydney, downright rollicking," he drawled iracibly. "Would you prefer I throw you down and have a go?"

She snorted. "Mind? Gutter? Let's seen some daylight between them, thank you."

"Let's get out of here," he said, ill-tempered, and began walking in the direction of nearby civilization.

"Wow. The boy can dish it, but he sure can't take it," Sydney called at his back, grinning wide.

Pout all he liked, Sydney hadn't much sympathy for him, and showed it freely.

He was trying to present to her a broken man, and she wasn't buying it. He was hurt, conflicted, at odds with himself and world, but not broken. He'd done heinous deeds, damnable deeds, put his soul at risk for wealth because he'd disdained of humanity. He'd been used, too, by anyone who saw his weakness, and exploited into being the creature he'd become. Atonement was achievably, and commendable – remarkably, Sydney had faith in him. But sympathy? No.

Sark wasn't a victim. Sark was an inevitability.

He stopped, illuminated in the darkness by the thin ray of a streetlight. He looked back at her crossly. "Are you coming?"

Smiling, still taunting, Sydney caught up to him, and took his offered hand. They walked aimless into the city under the grey cast of dawn.

-

"There is much that is immortal in this medieval lady. The dragons have gone, and so have the knights, but still she lingers in our midst_."_

- E. M. Forster, A Room with a View

_Can you take this life,  
Can you make it right,  
Do you have the words to say to make it  
All go away?  
You act so wise,  
And so refined.  
You can keep your lies 'cause I'm  
never gonna go your way. _

_- _Smile Empty Soul_, Your Way_

"You ain't leadin' but two things now, pal : Jack and shit. And Jack left town."

_-_ Ash,_ Army of Darkness_

_-_

The screams from that room never ceased, or quieted, or even varied. It was a constant noise, perpetual, and it eventually faded into white noise, like the air conditioner humming in the overhead vents.

"_Please! Stop, stop – I'll tell you! Anything, anything, I'll tell you! Please, just make him_ stop!"

Soon it was unintelligible, sputtering into a piercing howl of mindless pain. In a moment the door opened, rusted metal scraping against the aged granite floor. A man stepped out, expressionless, and stripped blood-slick disposable gloves from his hands.

It was a revolting sight for the lieutenant, who waited patiently for his attention.

"Sir," she prompted, once she had his attention. "There's someone here to see you. He's CIA, senior administrator. He didn't give his name, just asked for Agent James Lennox immediately."

The man nodded absently, smoothing out the wrinkled sleeves of his stained dress shirt. "Lead the way," he muttered.

Up empty stairs and through a labyrinth of cement and secrecy that was Alder Penitentiary, the lieutenant halted at the door into one of the interrogation rooms. It was identical to the one he'd just left but for one detail : in this room, there were cameras.

Arvin Sloane sat behind the steel table, leafing idly through a file.

The lieutenant followed orders, locking the door as she left. He stared impassively at Sloane, waiting.

"Agent Lennox," Sloane greeted, and waved absently to a chair. "Sorry to interrupt your work. I hope it's not a bad time?"

He pulled out the offered metal folding chair, sitting carelessly as he studied Sloane, unimpressed. "It's always a bad time around here. Who are you?"

"You know who I am," Sloane said lightly, and pushed the open file toward Lennox. "I need a favor. I'm CIA now, Black Ops devision. An agent of mine has gone rogue."

"I'm retired from the field," Lennox said flatly.

"Make an exception."

He glanced down at the picture, frowning. "No. She's a friend."

"There's no such thing, Renzo."

Lennox hissed, and slumped back angrily in his chair. After a moment he stood, and leapt lazily onto the table. From his sleeve (or from thin air?) he drew a switchblade, reaching for the security camera in the corner and slicing the wire cleanly.

"It's hard enough maintaining cover without you shouting my fucking name," he reprimanded, dropping back to the floor.

"This is a high-risk assignment. I need the best available."

"In exchange for what, exactly? Street credit?" he asked sarcastically.

"Before you and Sydney destroyed the Helix prototype, the CIA was able to download the schematics. That's Class 6 clearance, Renzo. They wouldn't give that to the butcher here at Alder Penitentiary, but the senior operations officer of A.P.O.?" He smiled darkly. "You ever want your real face back… I've already got a copy of the schematics just waiting to be built."

Lennox sighed, raking fingers along his scalp. "The objective?"

"She'll trust you. Get in close. I want both of them dead and buried, Dr. Markovic. Quickly."


	4. Willow Branches

**4. Willow Branches  
**-

Boredom was creeping in, banishing her half-formed strategy. Out of idleness she moved her knight, H5 to F6.

Sark castled, something she should have seen and probably had, his king to F8 and his rook to F7.

She took his rook. He moved his king to capture the knight.

"Either you're letting me win or you have the concentration of an apathetic Valium addict at a Quantum Theories lecture," he complained.

"Talk, talk. You're going down like a French border gate."

She built a defensive pawn wall as he repositioned his offense.

"Who, Sark?" she asked.

"It doesn't matter."

Around them, children screamed and birds sang, early morning in a city park, cool and calm as the two sat around the concrete table. They'd stopped here to rest, to make a plan, to argue. They played chess on a quaint granite board by a quaint neighborhood playground.

Sydney shook her head, still-damp hair flying in tangled waves. "It does matter. If you won't tell me, it matters."

"You know me so well," he murmurmed, and added, "Check."

She moved her king to safety without taking her eyes from his face.

"If you want my help, you'll have to start talking, Destiny Boy," she said.

"I swear to God, Sydney, where have your linguistic skills gone? I haven't heard such lame insults since Vaughn... well, since Vaughn said anything, really."

"Chitchat," she muttered. "Your empty past that, aren't you?"

"Telling you who Sloane hired me to assassinate won't accomplish anything. It's irrelevant," Sark insisted.

"Not so. Telling me who it is will help me figure what the hell I'm supposed to do with you," she snapped.

"It's you, love," he said calmly. "Checkmate."

She hesitated, looking blankly down at the board. "Damnit," she noted.

Sark leaned back, examining her critically as she clumsily rearranged things in her mind.

He waited.

Click.

"Sloane put a hit out on me!" she repeated, indignant. Then, "And you're just _now_ telling me!"

"Please, Sydney. Every backwater arms smuggler from here to Oslo has a contract out on your life."

"Say_ what_?"

"Why should this one be any different? There was no reason to tell you. You didn't trust Sloane anyway." Lazily, he began resetting the chesspieces for a rematch.

"Why? Why would Sloane want me dead? He's been pulling the Let's Be Friends crap for four frickin' years!"

"Don't ask me. I'm just the help," he said easily, smirking as he aligned the pawns.

Petulant, she swept the chesspieces onto the ground.

"I don't know why Sloane hired me to kill you, Sydney," Sark said suddenly, meeting her eyes. "All I know is that I won't let it happen."

She faltered, turning unsure to stare at a frail willow tree creaking in the soft breath of wind. "So we're both on the chopping block?"

"So it would seem."

Sydney laughed humorlessly. "Tell me you have a dastardly plan, Mr. Sark."

He shrugged. "Keep running, I suppose."

She glanced behind him, expressionless.

"No. Duck," she replied.

He jumped sideways as Sydney rolled under the stone table. Gunshots from twenty feet away rent the air, bullets raking the chair Sark had just vacated, the granite tabletop, the inlaid tiles of the black and white chessboard. A lone figure, dressed in Kevlar and a ski mask and wielding a submachine gun, fired from the cluster of willow trees beside the playground seesaw.

The neighborhood park exploded in frantic screaming.

Joggers and soccer moms fled in confused terror, running everywhere, running in circles, pushing their children into danger in their haste to protect. On his feet, Sark dodged around frightened children as he darted toward the gunman.

Weaponless, a bullet grazed his forearm as he weaved through the trees. Hastily Sark seized the wrist of a fleeing toddler, eliciting a splitting shriek, and wrestled away the neon yo-yo fastened to the boys finger.

The gunman spoke into his cuff. "All teams, all teams, target aquired. 32nd Drive, southwest, target aqui –"

A swinging mace of lime plastic struck him forcefully in the mouth.

Sark advanced ruthlessly, spinning the yo-yo in tight circles as he struck the guman again, and again, and again – mouth, jaw, knuckles, kneecap. Spitting blood and teeth, the assassin fired wildly, missing by a mile as he crumlped to the ground with a shattered knee from the brutal force of the makeshift flail.

Instantly Sark whipped the thin rope leash around the man's throat and pulled it taut. "_Who do you work for?_" he growled.

"We already know who he works for!" Sydney shouted, heralding children to their parents.

Sark blinked.

"Right. Habit," he muttered, and slammed the assassin's face into a tree.

"We have to get out of here," Sydney hissed, seizing his hand and tugging.

In a haze, Sark tossed the sobbing child back his yo-yo, unseeing of the dripping blood contaminating the toy. They fled.

-

Sydney unfastened his necktie, gently tugging it free from his collar. "Hold still," she breathed.

He stared at her through the darkness, and leaned in closer. Blatantly, languidly, Sark kissed her.

After a long moment she slapped him. "That's not holding still," she corrected, and bound the necktie tightly around his wounded forearm.

"Opportunist," he explained. "You're the one who's sitting on my lap."

"Space considerations, Sark. You're the one who signed the contract."

"You're truly going to use that in every argument, aren't you?"

"Every damn time."

The dank, dark alley engulfed them. Slices of sunlight shot through the ancient crates they hid behind, an unused loading zone for a forgotten boutique in the maze of a hundred other forgotten businesses. This was New York, after all, fantastic and filthly, larger than life, a city of forgiveness and short memory. Disappearance was easy.

There they hid.

Space considerations, indeed; In the narrow crevice they'd holed themselves up in (wise, covered from all angles, a direct line of sight to the entrance of the alley) there was barely enough room for one. Sydney sat folded against Sark with her knees tucked around his waist.

She was close enough to taste. A deity's sense of humor is lost on those mortal.

A sudden shadow passed the alley, eclipsing the sunlight. The two tensed, ready for battle. If discovered they were defenseless, without weapons and without escape – a paltry obituary for their legendary careers.

The shadow passed. Silence remained.

"At what point are we just hiding from ghosts?" Sydney murmured.

"Give it another hour. It'll take them all afternoon to comb the gridlock, and we can't outrun all of them. Besides, this is the most comfortable I've been in years."

He gave her his trademark smirk, unaware of the flashing memories it evoked of cruelty and massacre and smoke and betrayal. Sydney closed her eyes, shifting back, and never told him a stray bullet had gone through a toddler's chest that morning among the willow trees. He ran his hands along her folded legs.

"Stop it," she breathed.

"In a moment," he replied, kissing her jawline.

She laughed, hollow, whispering. "Still so selfish."

Sark froze. He wanted more than this, clumsy touches in a darkened alleyway. He wanted a fairytale, sunlight and satin sheets, and hidden things he'd never experienced. He was pushing for it, clawing, trying to force create something out of a dream that had never been reality – Sydney.

Sark wanted forgiveness, and it was admirable. But he was asking her to grant him salvation at the expense of everything she believed. He was asking her for trust when he hadn't earned it, love when he'd done nothing to warrant it. It would take time that he didn't have, and both of them were caught.

Grimacing, he turned away from her (ineffectual; she was seated on his damn lap) and stared through the narrow slits between the squalid crates they hid behind.

"Julian…"

"Leave it. I'm sorry," he said shortly.

Sydney had thought she had found Vaughn and it would be forever. So here, with Sark, was a slow death. And, for the record, he wasn't the least bit sorry.

"Why did you even accept the contract if you thought we were destined for eachother?" she murmured.

He closed his eyes. "Because I'd lost my faith," he answered.

She waited, staring at him with an expression of curious compassion. He let out an exaggerated sigh.

"Don't you get enough heartfelt confessions at home? Does everything have to be an overemotional overture?"

"Yes, because inviting someone to a baseball game 2,796.56 miles from home just to pontificate over a hypothetical is not at all overwrought," she snapped.

"Hissy, are we?"

Sydney fixed him with a Bristow glare.

"Sloane offered an embarrassing amount of money to have you killed. I accepted it because…" He avoided her eyes, a rarity for the remoteness of Mr. Sark. He started again.

"When I met you… God, Sydney, it was unbearable. I'd met my match and I wanted you so badly. Only it was the wrong time, the wrong side, the wrong life. I spent years waiting, waiting for aliances to shift, wounds to heal, scars to fade – but they never did. There was nothing left for me. Hope didn't exist for executioners... I wanted it over with. So when Sloane offered, I signed away my future."

He smiled, briefly. "And I want it back."

Quietly, Sydney answered his earlier question : "I think I could, Julian."

A figure stepped cautiously into the alleyway, firearm raised. Any thoughts of playing possum dissolved when he sidestepped the surrounding crated and aimed stiffly at Sark's forehead. "Stand up!" he commanded.

Sark groaned, infuriated at the ill timing of their executioner. Too many breakthroughs had been interrupted by assassins in recent days.

The heavy crates that had shielded them now caged them in. The only exit was blocked by the gunman, and weaponless, a Sundance shootout was not an option. They'd been forced to hide here because Sark had refused Sydney's government aid, and scorned his own contacts. The past had caught up rather faster than he'd expected.

Slowly, Sydney stood, and she was afraid. Dimly Sark realized that it was a sentiment he should mirror, a feeling left dormant after a lifetime of close-calls and spitting in the face of Fate. At that moment he craved fear, a basic emotion made primal. Inane, but he wanted to die human.

The masked assassin touched the trigger. "Any last wishes?"

Sydney let out a shaky breath, and narrowed her eyes. "There are so many sarcastic answers to that, it's hard to chose just one."

"Down on your knees."

Sark ignored the gunman, watching Sydney as if a trance as she angrily complied. It seemed perverse that she should die here, when escape had been her specialty way back when they had been adversaries.

Way back, he thought. Two days ago she'd hated him. He shouldn't have asked her to love him.

A hiss sounded from a distance, somewhere from the mouth of the alley, and a dart burried itself in the assassin's throat. With a direct flow to the bloodstream, the narcotic took hold quickly; The gunman collapsed after a moment of incoherent stumbling.

Sark glanced at Sydney, bemused. "How do these things keep working out for you?"

Presently their rescuer stepped into the view, tranquilizer gun held ready. Instinctively Sark seized hold of Sydney and spun her sideways, trapping her body between his and the wall.

The newcomer again fired. A small needle buried itself in Sark's bicep.

Suddenly Sydney was pushing against Sark, shoving him out of the way. She was smiling. "Jim? Jim, is that you?"

Sydney's most recent guardian angel was a tall, hawkish man dressed in casual civillian clothes. He accepted Sydney's hug briefly, never taking his eyes off of Sark. He brusquely issued commands. "Syd! Are you alright? C'mere, get behind me. Hands where I can see them, Sark."

Sark had been inspecting the dart in his arm critically. He glanced up at the mention of his name, blinking slowly.

"Oh God, Jim. You shot Julian," Sydney exclaimed, still clutching the agent's hand.

"I thought he was attacking you. You're working with him?" was the surprised reply.

Sark took a shaky step forward, uneven on his feet. "I'm fine… bloody… tranquilizer…"

Sydney rushed to Sark's side, catching him as he swayed dangerously. Frowning, she mercilessly ripped the dart from his bicep and cast it away.

"Ow… I'm fine… who the hell…?" Sark muttered.

"This is Jim Lennox. He's a friend," she soothed. "He's one of the good guys, Julian."

"Bloody marvellous… saves us with tranquilizers… bloody… _girl_."

With that hissed epithet, the anesthetic took final hold. Sark's legs gave out and he collapsed, dragging Sydney with him to the ground.


	5. Dance, Idiot, Dance

**5. Dance, Idiot, Dance**  
**---**

He spoke slowly, toneless, voice filled with rust. His head was pounding and his tongue felt too big in his mouth. "This is the worst road trip since King Louis and Marie Antionette fled to Austria."

The obscure history lesson fell on deaf ears. Sydney was seated shotgun beside Lennox, leaning over anxiously to grill the agent without mercy.

"Who sent you? Why? How did you find us?"

"Relax," Lennox commanded, navigating absently through the dense New York traffic. "You disappeared for two days, Syd. Aside from being the CIA's top field agent, you have a habit of getting kidnapped. They sent me out to make sure you were fine. Which you weren't."

Sark listened closely from the backseat of the sleek '02 Maserati coupe. He was strewn across the leather seat, limbs numb and body aching. The sedative had regressed only enough to leave him near-paralyzed and spectacularly belligerent.

He resumed complaining : "I don't care if you're CIA. You don't come to the rescue with anesthetic."

Sydney audaciously rolled her eyes. "Sark is morally opposed to tranquilizers."

Lennox smiled humorlessly. "Assassin - I assume he would be."

"Reformed," they chorused.

Shaking his head, Lennox cut through the packed, brutal lanes, horns blearing and lights flashing and hell, thought Sark, he'd never asked to be rescued.

"I tracked you to New York pretty easily. A friendly front desk clerk remembered you," Lennox explained, and shot a bemused smirk Sydney's way. She blushed vibrantly, and laughed.

Sark truly despised inside jokes.

"Sark's suite was destroyed and there was a dead body in the kitchen. No sign of either of you. I could practically hear your father having a heart attack through the phone," Lennox noted. "I ran a check of the dead assassin through the database and found his group. Just some mercenaries, making a buck from amateur murders. I found one prowling Long Island and shadowed him until he led me to you two."

"Amazing. You can follow standard field tactics," Sark muttered.

Sydney turned in her seat to glare. "Hilarious, Julian. You here all week?"

"I have questions, Syd," Lennox said.

She shrugged. "I thought you were retired from the field, Jim."

"I am. I'm a scout now – no guns, no aliases. I listen and I report. These days it's just tracking devices and tranqs."

He parked the Maserati in a reserved spot on the curb in front of a massive high-rise building, twenty levels of granite and glass and money. "There's a safehouse upstairs," he supplied. "I'd get you out of the city but they're monitoring the roads, and we can't go on foot with Mr. Badass here in his condition."

"And whose fault is that, you puerile bastard?" Sark replied, the insult stunted by the low, lethargic delivery.

"I thought the Long Island safehouse was on Lynbrook," Sydney wondered.

Lennox fixed her with a strange look. "It was, three years ago."

There was a brief, scalding flash of pain in her eyes, and she smiled. "Ah. I was… away, for a few years. Evil shadow organization with a yen for brainwashing. The Lynbrook house was compromised?"

"By termites, yes."

"I love the safehouse in Amarillo. I had to hide out from a drug czar who was selling antipyrine-laced heroin – he sent this whole army of goons out looking for me. I was there for almost a week. The furniture, the architecture, the view… it was heaven."

"I don't usually take time to admire safehouses," Lennox admitted. "Ever see the one in Brunswick?"

"Sydney?" Sark asked calmly. "Not to interrupt your scintillating chat, but would you mind puncturing my eardrums with a screwdriver? I'd do it myself, but I'm fucking paralyzed. Thank you."

Taking the hint, Lennox switched off the engine of the Maserati. Sydney went about the dangerous task of moving a half-unconscious Julian Sark.

Lennox led the way, opening and holding doors for the encumbered Sydney, half-carrying Sark as he stumbled clumsily with his arm thrown heavily across her shoulders. They made it to the elevator without the former assassin collapsing in a cacophony of deadened limbs and free profanity.

The CIA-bought apartment was on the top floor. In the elevator they were joined by a white-haired woman holding flowers and dressed in shades of sea foam green.

Flanked by Lennox and Sydney, Sark swayed dangerously on his feet, reawakening muscles spasming at random, and dropped his head onto her shoulder. Sydney smiled in nervous politeness at the tiny old lady beside them.

"Oh, my," the woman exclaimed. "You're young man doesn't look too well, does he? Is he ill, poor thing?"

Sark spoke without lifting his head, in a flat, humorless voice, before Sydney could make any other reply : "I've just come from a 38-hour run on red Methamphetamine and am currently on my way upstairs to sleep it off before I snort a few grams of heroin and engage in a three-way with my girlfriend and this guy here whose name I can't remember. Love your hat, by the way, very 20's retro."

Sydney elbowed him, but it was too late. The fragile elderly lady stared uncomprehending at Sark, at a loss for words. She ushered out of the elevator at the next stop.

"Or," said Sydney to the silence of the elevator, "you could have just said 'Something I ate'."

---

_He was in the habit of taking things for granted -  
Granted, there wasn't much for him to take.  
And the only thing constant was the constant reminder he'd never change._

- Hot Hot Heat_, You Owe Me an IOU_

_"It is true that events lasting only a moment may achieve more than a courtship lasting a year."_

_- Alexandre Dumas, La Dame aux Camelias_

_---_

She told Lennox to find some aspirin. She escorted Sark into the bedroom.

The apartment was a sprawling, silent loft – modern, beautiful, and impersonal. Tasteful leather furniture and photographs of strangers on the wall, all the pieces were placed with care, yet no one would ever make the mistake of thinking anyone actually lived there. This apartment held ghosts, memories of blood and fright, and it was exactly like every safehouse Sydney had ever been in.

"I hate these places," Sark announced viciously, a mind-reader drunk on anesthetic.

Without comment Sydney pushed him toward the bed, tugging off his ruined Armani in unhalting efficiency.

He would have been wolfish, smirking, drawling innuendos with his accent heightened just so, but his mind was spinning and he felt like crap. Fate again, adamantly against him; Sydney Bristow was tearing off his clothes and he was too damn tired to exploit it.

She stripped him to his undershirt and boxers. "For the record," he mumbled, "I'm being devilishly suave."

Sydney shoved him onto the bed and arranged the pillows under his head. She closed the drapes and switched off the lights, and he was asleep before she softly kissed him goodnight.

---

"Then you showed up and saved the day."

Lennox watched her carefully, seated beside him on the arm of a low leather couch. This was Sydney Bristow, blood and bone, looking small and dark and out of her depth. Lennox remembered her - in Cayo Concha, at the freight yard in Poland, at the CIA headquarters - three years and a thousand scars ago, and wondered if even she knew the secrets hidden her voice. Intoxicating.

"I understand why Sark would run off with you," Lennox said slowly, leaning casually back. "But why would you run off with Sark?"

Hours had passed and night had fallen. They sat in the open livingroom, illuminated in shades of grey and indigo, moonlight slicing clear through the glass sliding doors of the balcony.

She was irritable, tired – impatience was evident in her voice. "I told you everything, Jim. Sloane put a hit out on both of us."

"You really believe that?"

Sydney didn't answer. She fixed him with an empty gaze and spoke with silence.

Lennox let out a grunt of frustration. "Have you ever considered that it's a trap? Sydney, this is Julian Sark we're talking about. Julian Sark. I'd have to take off my shoes to count how many times he's made the Most Wanted list. I'm not saying Arvin Sloane is exactly Employee of the Year, but Christ, he's Director of A.P.O.. Why would he want you dead?"

"How do you know about A.P.O.?" she asked quietly.

He laughed hollowly. "God, Syd, you trust nobody but him, do you? I was assigned to find you. Don't you think they'd tell me what your job is these days?"

"I'm sorry, Jim," Sydney burst, exhaustion slicing through the stone expression of her eyes. "I know you're trying to help. Of course I've considered Julian is lying. Of course I know his background – damnit, I was practically the only agent trying to stop him until he was arrested! He's killed, tortured or blackmailed practically everyone in my address book. But he's telling me he's changed and I _believe_ him."

He didn't look at her. Lennox reached across the coffee table and picked up a sterling silver letter opener, tediously running his finger along the dull blade. "So you think Arvin Sloane is trying to kill you. What makes you believe Sark isn't lying?"

She closed her eyes, bit her lip, spoke barely above a whisper : "Because I know what it feels like to be terrified of yourself."

He showed no signs of listening. Continuing his obscure fascination, he held the letter opener inches from his face, breath against the silver blade. "What else are you terrified of, Sydney?"

Something was wrong here. It clicked in Sydney's brain, an internal warning, a sudden rush of blood in her veins. She moved to her feet. "Jim, are we safe here?"

Lennox shrugged, finally returning the letter opener to the table. "Not really," he said. "You're just as likely to be found here than in any other place on Long Island. We'll be fine for a while, but I wouldn't suggest holding fort here for more than a day." He smirked. "Who knows, you could be found already. Goes with the trade, sweetheart."

"Call your handler," she instructed. "Tell them you found Agent Bristow, alone. Just… tell them I was on vacation. Will you do that for me, Jim?"

Lennox smiled, squeezing her arm in a sudden show of affection. "Anything for you, Bristow. What are friends for?"

Sydney nodded softly, watching him head for the door – payphones were standard field procedure when contacting headquarters. She stood alone in the darkness as he shut the door behind him.

Silence. She could hear her breath, harsh, loud.

Sydney turned and headed down the narrow hallway into the bedroom. It was pitch-black.

A hand covered her mouth from behind.

She would have screamed. She would have thrashed. She would have thrown the assailant over her shoulder and broken all twelve of his ribs with a single kick. Woulda, coulda, shoulda. She recognized the scent of him instantly.

"Scared of the dark, love?" Sark whispered in her ear.

"It's the monster in the closet that keeps me awake, Julian," she answered against his palm.

She felt him laugh deep in his chest, pressed flush against him with his free arm wrapped tight around her waist. Fully recovered from the tranquilizer dart, Sark was alert, agitated, and looking for a fight.

The variety of the fight was mildly worrisome. "Sharpening your skills or just trying to spook me?" she wondered.

"Boredom, I'm afraid," he said. "Where's Agent Lollipop got to?"

Sydney turned in his grasp, shaking off his hand from her mouth. "Following protocol and updating his handler like the good little government agent I haven't been. I told him we're not going anywhere near Los Angeles anytime soon."

She couldn't see his smirk in the heavy darkness, but felt it like a sixth sense. "Excellent," he remarked. "Then I'd like to have my wicked way with you now, if that's alright?"

Sydney scoffed. "Permission? That's new."

"I'm sick of waiting."

He was out of breath before he even began kissing her.

---

The sudden flash of light was near-blinding. Lennox grimaced, blinking quickly, and walked silently into the immaculately furnished kitchen.

He was listening, idle of his surroundings, to the autocratic voice spitting through the cellphone plastered to his ear.

"I know the objective," he said shortly, and was instantly cut off by the continuing spiel of the speaker.

Distracted, Lennox leaned against the steel countertop, immersed detachedly in the repeated orders being recited vehemently by Sloane.

"I _know_ you want them dead before sunrise," Lennox said tersely through clenched teeth. "I have to wait until I can get them off-guard and apart. I'm no match for Bristow if she's armed and ready. And Sark… hell, who knows how creative he can be if he sees me aiming a gun at him? There's no fucking _chance_ I'm going to test his newfound good will when there's a Beretta in the mix."

Sloane again took control of the conversation, a constant flow of hissing words streaming through the phone's speaker.

"No. She has no idea," Lennox assured. "She never even mentioned Santos."

He paused to listen, glaring motiveless into space.

"They're in the bedroom," he answered. "What do you mean, did I check? Yeah, they're preoccupied. They're all over eachother."

He shifted on his feet, left to right.

"Yeah, yeah," he grunted. "I'll kill 'em in a minute. Shit, I've been Mr. Sensitivity all day, I'm tired…"

A final curt warning was issued and the line went dead. Lennox pocketed the cellphone and rolled his eyes, incensed.

Suddenly, decisively, he moved across the kitchen and yanked open a drawer. A dull shine reflected off the silverware inside, a long row of forks, spoons, and wide variety of knives.

---

She tasted like… well, he'd say water, but the absurdity would outweigh the poetic. She tasted like fine wine and salvation.

He spared one hand to reach back and fling the door shut. His other was reserved for tangling through Sydney's hair, pulling her closer, fervent, zealous, parting her teeth with his tongue.

Heaven or Hell, given the choice, Sark would declare it Purgatory. Dreams met chaotically with reality, the Sometime Future colliding head-on with the Now, unexpected, undeserved – memories lashed at him even with the sensory overload of Sydney Bristow catching her legs around his waist to be lifted off the ground.

Sark didn't have time (inclination) to think (obsess) as he slid his hand over the ruffled material of that damn cutesy little pheasant skirt Sydney had worn to the baseball game, a day and a dive through Little Neck Bay ago. He carried her readily to the low dresser beside the bedroom door, setting her down lightly as he ran his fingers through her thick dark hair – a tendencing bordering on fetish – and attacked her neck with his mouth. He felt, rather than heard, her sudden easy laughter.

"You missed the bed by a good ten feet," she noted, her voice low, sultry, and hell, thought Sark, he couldn't touch her fast enough.

"That's what I love about you," he answered, his mouth disengaged by the neccessity (the intoxication) of Sydney tugging his shirt off over his head. "Such high expectations."

She had short, blunt fingernails. He let out a demoralizing gasp when she ran them across his chest.

---

Steak knives, paring knives, butter knives. After a brief inspection, Lennox shut the drawer.

He stepped back to make a visual sweep of the kitchen. Calmly he walked over to the sink and swung open the cabinet beneath. A cluster of jugs and bottles greeted him, bleach, liquid soap, Draino. Labels screamed ingredients at him : sodium hypochlorite, ethylene glycol, hydrogen peroxide.

Headlining the labels were cheerful warnings against ingestion.

---

The enterprise to find the bed had again failed. An obscurely willing Sydney was caught between Sark and the hardwood floor.

For all he knew, the world existed solely of flawless pale skin and echoes of Sydney's laughter. A month ago in prison he had envisioned rose petals and candlelight, '89 Cabernet Sauvignon and slow kisses to quench his thirst – nothing like this, mischievous fumbling on the edge of exhaustion. This was not how Julian Sark would make love to his goddess, spirited and playful, not the burning simplicity with which she now saucily bit his shoulder.

This was too slight, too trifling, too _effortless_, after a lifetime of indistinct hunger. But it was euphoria, exquisite, and Sydney had soft, nimble fingers.

Sark finally mastered the last button of her cotton blouse. "I had a plan, you know," he murmured, tossing the shirt aside. "Before the grand epiphany. A great, masterful plan."

Her tongue was doing artful things to his collar bone. Sark half-forgot what he was saying, neither paying attention to his hazy explanation.

He ran a finger along her spine, speaking haltingly. "I was going to steal billions, topple governments. Plural, Sydney – I was going to crumble the whole fucking world. The only sticking point was how to trick you into being my evil queen."

Sydney insistantly raked her nails along his scalp. "Stop talking so much."

---

Frowning, Lennox fumbled around in the cabinet of chemical bottles. Finally, he struck gold.

He withdrew a flask of Windex and a soft dish sponge.

Carefully, obsessively, he took the 9mm. Silencer pistol from his jacket holster, engaged the safety, and began polishing the loaded bullet chamber.


	6. Even Superman Shot Himself

**Author's Note:** I come with excuses. I rock like that.  
In the months since I've updated, I have buried my father, studied string theory physics, and gone to rehab to kick a meth habit.  
…Yeah. I know.  
To everybody who has reviewed and asked politely for an update, thank you so much for even reading what few chapters there are and know that I sincerely do apologize for the delay.  
To everyone who wrote me up and cussed me out for not updating, maybe you should clear your head a little to get a sense of perspective. I suggest a long walk down a short pier. Idle threats and four letter words do not induce me to write faster. But thanks.  
Happy belated new year. Cheers.

(Please note the timeline and rating of this story. It would benefit you to remember Nadia isn't comatose here and that this is rated M for graphic violence. Okay then? Ginchy.)

For the faithful:

**6. Even Superman Shot Himself  
---**

It was Monday morning and the end of the world.

Soft sunlight filtered through the thin curtains, the room shaded in a gold pallor, and Sydney lay still, unblinking, barely breathing. She was propped up on one elbow, glossy hair spilling over her bare shoulders, watching… a man? A monster? (A fragment of a boy left for dead.) He slept deeply, arms fastened insistantly at her waist. He was beautiful.

And he would absolutely murder her if she ever said that out loud.

The clock on the nightstand had been chiding her for hours; It was well past dawn and last night's dream had been broken the moment she opened her eyes. This was, easily, the most momentous mistake she'd made in years. She cared little. Sark was so _sure_ that she could love him, and the man could be damn persuasive.

The more she thought on it, the less Sydney missed the life she had forfeited when she kissed the mouth of a murderer.

But still. She'd left a lot of holes in her life with the cookie-cutter slices she'd devoted to normality. Friends, family, a home. Clumsy pieces that would no longer fit if she kept on this path.

It was time.

Sydney slid from Sark's grasp, careful not to wake him. She dressed quickly (her shirt torn in two different places; impatience, impatience) and paused only to fold his discarded clothes and leave them in a neat pile on the nightstand. She padded into the empty kitchen and boiled water, rightfully assuming he would disdain of coffee.

They were assuredly, irrevocably, screwed.

She wondered what Lennox must think of her – or, critical, who he must have told. She'd been careless last night, allowing Sark to have his way when he wanted nothing more than to tear her cleanly from the pretty webbing that bound her to her life in Los Angeles. Sark wanted her for himself, wholly, solely, and he'd known damn well that Lennox would return in the night and find her tangled in satin sheets and Sark's arms.

_Opportunist._ He was always upfront about his propensity for dastardly deeds.

Sydney saw him through the glass wall separating the balcony and the livingroom. Lennox stood against the railing in the sliver of sun breaking the sky, eyes darting down to follow the ceaseless movement of the street down.

He made no sign of having heard her. The marble-painted cement was cold to the touch of her bare feet.

"Good morning, Jim," Sydney said, because, okay, what else was there to say?

"Hey, sleepyhead," he answered, eyes never leaving the tangle of traffic twenty floors below.

This didn't fit. Sydney tried to break Lennox down, compartmentalize, box and bow and label him solved. It didn't work. Jim Lennox had been static on her radar since the word Go. Something about it didn't fit. He didn't _fit_.

"So how long have you been sleeping with the infamous blond sociopath?" he asked.

Timid, Sydney reached out to grasp his shoulder. He made no move, no attempt to turn his gaze to her.

"If Emma had asked you to leave everything and run with her, what would you have done?" she whispered.

No response. It hit her again. This didn't fit.

"I don't know what this is, this thing I have with Sark. I just don't know, Jim. But it's real. It feels… like life and death. Like stealing the bomb with the guards just one door away. Adrenaline. It's wrong but I don't care. If it were Emma – god, Jim, if it were Emma!"

"It's not Emma," he answered lowly. Still his eyes were focused below. Still he spoke without so much as a tremor in his voice. "It's not a soft-hearted CIA field analyst we're talking about. It's Julian Sark. What I wanna know is how a good girl like you can sleep at night with a killer keeping you warm."

Tears sprung to Sydney's eyes. This is what she had expected. "You should never have come, Jim."

Suddenly he spun to meet her. Eyes that had avoided her were cold and alive. "You should never have gone with Sark," he said.

The static that had clouded Sydney's internal radar now snapped, shouted, crystal clear. She had ignored her instincts and it was fatal. There was a knife in his sleeve and now it was in his hand. With his free hand his yanked her by the hair and now, now the knife was in her stomach.

"You should never have gone with Sark," he said, and, brutally, kissed her mouth. "He's going straight to hell."

It was a switchblade. Short, ridged, a slight leverage curve at the end. Lennox gave the knife one sharp twist before wrenching it (dripping) from her body.

"You trust people too easily, Syd."

She was still standing. Lennox watched, laughing, as the immortal Sydney Bristow stood trembling on her feet, one hand against her stomach as blood slipped through her fingers like so many grains of sand. Her brain had yet to catch up to her body (a deathblow like that, shock, locking off the nerve endings momentarily while her circuits took stock of the damage) but still, those eyes of hers. Black, they saw Lennox smile and even then they betrayed not a scintilla of fear.

"Markovic," she said. "Liar."

That was all. She fell against the railing and lay there. Blood ran down her stomach, down her chest, trickled down her dangling arms and dripped from her fingertips onto the windshields of the cars a hundred feet below.

-

He awoke with a smile on his face.

The bed was still warm. The air clung to him, thick, scents of Sydney and sex and sunlight. She was gone, but that didn't worry him unduly. He'd never expected to fall asleep with her beside him and thus wouldn't push his luck to wake up so. She'd folded his clothes. And straightened the blankets over him. He'd put money down that she'd even made him tea.

He had the sneaking suspicion that he'd finally got the girl.

Sark resisted the temptation to call up Michael Vaughn just to laugh at the son of a bitch.

He stared at the ceiling, half-awake and feeling reflective. This was likely the best his life had been (and would be) in a long time. A hunted man, wanted jailed by his enemies and wanted dead by his peers. He searched for a better word than peers and found none. Blackmailers, killers, thieves. Sark wondered at the day he could legitimately call them anything but kin.

Seeking out Sydney had been an act of desperation. One last shot at happiness before he resigned himself to misery. It was beginning to look like the most brilliant strategy he'd conceived in years.

He'd take her to Galway. Then Paris. Madrid. They'd spend their lives running. They'd call it a vacation. It was a twisted way for Sark to achieve his happiness.

He thought it best not to interrogate destiny.

Sark heard voices down the hall, faint, distorted by walls and distance. Sark had been awake at dawn to hear the bedroom door open, watching through shielded eyes as the CIA agent took in the sight of Jack Bristow's daughter in bed with a criminal.

Paroled. The pricetag of that word went untold.

He'd give her some space. Some time to talk it out with Lennox. Jim was her friend, Sark reminded himself, and it would be deadly to push her too hard.

He dressed to the waist, stretching, muscles stiff from the swift change from the dormancy of prison to the exertion of combat. The flight from the hotel room. The ambush in the the park. The bruises and cuts, the wash of the dissolved tranquillizer. And Sydney was no kitten. So Sark stretched, and grimaced.

The apartment was entirely still now. Tossing his shirt of his shoulder, Sark moved to the bathroom.

Lennox watched as the assassin bent to splash water over his face. Slowly, gun raised, he stepped passed the open doorway.

Sark didn't even glance at the mirror. The slight whisper of Lennox's foot passing from carpet to tile was enough to alert him.

He lifted a cloth to his face, giving no sign of havng noticed the intruder. A quick scan of the countertop gave him no further options. Unless Sydney made a habit of sharpening her toothbrush, there were no weapons at hand.

Without so much as a sigh Sark folded the cloth and replaced it before turning to face the 9-milimeter aimed at his face.

"Hello," he said mockingly. "I didn't see you there."

Sark had never met James Lennox before yesterday and had no feelings either way about his sudden treachery. It had been thought of and half-suspected, but Sark had trusted him on the strength of Sydney's faith.

An assassin you knew was better than one you didn't. A calculated risk, and Sark saw that it had gotten them killed after all.

"Sloane sent you, then?" Sark observed, shrugging into his shirt and casually fastening the buttons. Four were missing. Sydney's slight revenge for his carnage.

He'd asked for a memory. It was a good one.

Lennox smiled, but nobody could match the smirk of Julian Sark in his heyday. This one was sarcastic, gloating, unrefined. Sark would enjoy killing this man. "That's right. Sloane offered me a job and I took it. Kinda like you, only I follow through."

Sark asked this once : "Where is Sydney?"

Lennox ignored him. There was a speech locked up in the hitman's head, waiting to be let free, but Sark was a disapassionate listener. "What makes you think you're above this all now? That you're a better man than me because you _feel really bad?_ You sicken me, Lazarey. You wax poetic about saving your soul but you're still just a goddamn murderer."

Lennox had forgotten that Derevko's famed wolfhound never played games. "I am better than you. Unfairness does not translate into unreality." Sark paused, and looked him in the eye. "I won't ask you again."

"I put a knife in her gut," Lennox spat. "Such a sweet thing, never saw it coming. I didn't think the legendary Sydney Bristow would go down that easy. But then loyalty always was her weakness. I left her bleeding on the balcony."

Sark never batted an eye. Never caught a breath. "I suggest you pull the trigger," he said.

"She trusted you," Lennox continued. "You've got nobody to blame but yourself, Lazarey. You're the one who dragged her into all of this."

Sark tried to maintain his calm. Tried to hold his composure seamless. He couldn't help it. He scoffed. "Sloane put a contract out on her life, you wretched ass. She was in this whether I was involved or not."

"She's dead by now."

"So are you."

Sark had him against the wall and by the throat before Lennox could squeeze the trigger.

Lennox fired, twice, shattering the mirror and gauging the ceiling. Sark seized hold of the assassin's head and pressed down with his thumb. Shrieking, unbearable and endless, rang out through the apartment as Sark's thumbnail penetrated the sclera, through the vitreous and into the optical nerve of Lennox's left eye.

The trail of gloating had ceased from Lennox's throat. Now all that sounded was the piercing, indistinct wail of unendurable pain. It was cacophonous, repulsive, the dispicable pain, and his face (a stolen face, but nonethless…) was eclipsed by a stream of blood and ichor.

Sark wiped his hand on the cloth laying folded beside the sink. As suddenly as they'd come, the screams faded.

He stepped over Lennox, who lay fallen on the bathroom tile. "Kill me," Lennox rasped. "Make it… stop."

There were few things more painful than having your eye put out. Sark had known this. Though he'd never done it with his bare hands.

"_Please_," Lennox whispered.

"You'd better pray she's still alive," he answered. "Or you _will_ be. For a very long time."

He tore out of the bedroom, leaving the traitor immobile on the floor.

Sark realized he couldn't remember the sound of Sydney's laughter. All he heard were screams.

-

She awoke with a siren in her ear.

The room was cool, dark, empty. Leather straps bound her wrists to the hospital bed. Flashes of the Covenant – brainwashing, torture, a tollbridge and a left turn from a goddamn labotamy – replayed in her mind, and the monitor linked to her heartbeat jittered like a jackrabbit.

Jack and Nadia came running. Outside the hospital room window, a wailing ambulence passed.

"Sydney," he father gasped, and touched her face. "Sydney."

Nadia circled around. With quaking hands she hastily undid the bindings on her half-sister's wrists. "You're awake," she said, and barely believed it.

Sydney had one word to say and could manage no more. "Julian?"

-

**Author's Note (**by RitaX's insistence I know nothing makes sense yet. That's just the kind of annoying f---er I am.

Lord, I need a beta.


	7. The Dreamer

**A/N: **It's just been a weird year. Sorry.

So many people to thank that I simply can't list you all. I'll be as fast as I can and simply thank **gblisa** forpossibly the best review I've ever had, **Emma** for keeping me in her special little folder,the lovely faithful **Ann** (thanks for sticking with me girl!), **Karone Evertree** for calling me out on sounding pretentious, **SerpientePrincess** (I know I never relpied to your beta offer back in _January_, but are you maybe still available? I work slow and I don't pay, but... uhhh... I'm extremely hygenic?) and **Domlando Blonaghan** forreminding meI haven't updated since freaking January._January! _Anybody I'm forgetting, feel free to flame me in return.

Also, my screenname has been changed from RainbowGroupie to telekineticburn, because the former has been a dormant name for me forabout a year now and it was too confusing for me to remember.

Thank you all so much for sticking with me. I'm officially an out-patient now! Woot, woot!

Because I think torture and literature debates are sexy :

**-**

**7. The Dreamer **

-

Sydney Bristow died today.

There will be no funeral.

-

Inside it was black and cold (and he heard the walls whisper, '_I've seen you here before'_), so familiar – familiar concrete, familiar filth; echoes only for the key he held in his fist. This wasn't _his_ prison, of course, but Sark could not be at ease in this sudden time warp: it was almost as if he'd never left.

"Prove it, Lazarey. Show me you're a man of morals now."

The prisoner was strapped to a second-hand pool table inside the rented storage garage. Chained securely, sedative wearing thin, he was half-way hysterical at the very thought of being tortured. Expert that he was, Renzo Markovic had never yet been on the receiving end of those pliers and bolt cutters he could wield with such dexterity. Every scientist has his lab rats, after all. And his sickest techniques were as parlor tricks to the cruelty of Julian Sark.

"Morals are a matter of taste," his jailer answered. There was a tray beside Lennox arrayed carefully with a selection of short blades, thumbtacks, a letter opener -all bought conveniently on sale.

An oddity, really. Office Depot could turn slaughterhouse by someone with the wrong intentions.

"You're going to tell me everything you know," Sark told him, "and then I am going to hurt you worse."

Lennox smiled, his bloodless pale face grey in the light of the single candle. "Having trouble breaking the habit, Sark? I thought you found God."

Sark let out a sharp, sudden laugh that rang through the cold hollow room. "You're confusing belief with faith. I've become convinced in the Higher Power, just as I've come to absolutely despise the bastard. Save your sermons. _Sydney_ is my religion."

"Girl's your religion? '_God is Dead'_, indeed."

Sark smiled wryly. "Thumbtacks and Nietzsche. My, we've hit all the clichés, and you're not even bleeding yet."

"A better one: '_Morality is the herd instinct of the individual_.'"

Sark took aim and broke his nose with a single swipe of his hand. "'_You scotched the snake, not killed it_'. Sloppy work, _Lennox_, she's a Bristow."

It took a long moment for the statement to take hold. It was a killing stroke for Lennox, in a twisted kind of way, because it meant _hope_. Torture is blackmail made bloody; you cannot convince a dead man to speak without first offering him life. But with Sydney alive? Maybe he hadn't quite damned himself completely.

Lennox kept quiet for a long moment. Blood and pain and… Sark had done the despicable thing of telling him he might be spared.

"Only you would quote Macbeth to tell a guy he fucked up," he muttered. "Still. '_Present fears are less than horrible imaginings_.'"

"Why Sydney? Why _her?_" he hissed.

Lennox gave a slow, snarling laugh. "You think you've seen it all, kid? I'm more afraid of Sloane than of your little knives."

Sark selected a craft blade, testing the tip against his finger. Blood drew at the slightest pressure. "I'm sure," he said. "Still, should you change your mind, just give me a wink. Oh, wait – I'm sorry, was that uncouth?"

"'_Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves_.'"

"Quoting Confucius, now? I feel better already." Sark made the first incision: long, shallow, collar bone to sternum. Lennox let out the barest hiss of pain. "We'll start slow – why did Sloane hire me for the job those years ago?"

"'_Our repentance is not so much regret for the ill we have done as fear of the ill that may happen to us in consequence,_'" Lennox gritted. And, "'_I will not add another word._"

With a sudden violence Sark seized a fistful of Lennox's hair as he leaned in close. "Rochefoucald. Horace. Do you want to play this little game? '_To knock a thing down… is a deep delight of the blood._'"

Lennox caught the reflection of his own ghastly ruined face in Sark's impenetrable black sunglasses. Fear was a poison taking hold as he answered, "George Santayana. The irony of you quoting him has no bounds. '_Don't be too sure I'm as crooked as I'm supposed to be.'_"

"Dashiell Hammett. Or is it Bogart you're referencing? Cinema's fair game, I suppose. '_My theory is that everyone is a potential murderer_.'"

"_Sunset Boulevard_. American classics? I wouldn't expect that from y-"

Sark took the letter opener and slammed it down through Lennox's hand. The silver tip bit through bone and tendon and buried itself in the worn felt of the pool table. Lennox screamed, a harrowing sound, equal only to…

… a thousand other screams Sark had heard before.

"Sloane keeps his own secrets," Lennox gasped, thrashing pointlessly against his bindings. "I was following orders. '_I'm the only cause I'm interested in._'"

Sark smiled indulgently. "_Casablanca_. Sloane may have his secrets. I'm currently digging for yours." He took back up his scalpel, gently tipping Lennox's head to the side.

"What're you – _aaaugh!_"

He started behind the ear and traced a line down, curving the blade along Lennox's jaw, down his neck (the nearby pulse jittery as Sark broke the skin without severing the platysma muscle – an artist's touch) and finally stopping two inches above his collarbone.

It was so _dark_, and it was so _cold_. All his rambling, desperate discussion died away as Lennox forced himself to remain still.

The blade was held poised at his neck; that lifeless voice, accent thick and mocking, breathed against his ear. "I found her bleeding against a railing."

"I can't tell you," Lennox said.

But Sark wasn't even listening by then.

"I picked her up, held her in my arms. I'd never done that until the night before, do you realize? Only once. She was barely alive. Barely breathing. She barely had the strength to grasp my hand." Sark's hand wavered, and it was on purpose. A spasm of pain added to the blaze of agony attacking Lennox's nervous system. "I took her to the hospital. I called her father. And then I had to leave her."

Sark's free left hand flashed out and struck Lennox in the ribcage. He wanted to recoil, scream, flail, but the craft knife hovered waiting to impale.

"I had to _leave her_," Sark yelled, deafening in the lightless cell. "Because I'm a _wanted man_. Because I _violated parole_. She's laying in the hospital somewhere and _I can't protect her_, because I'm _wasting_ my time on a pathetic little sycophant with delusions of importance."

"You kill me," Lennox whispered. "You kill me and you're never gonna find your way back. Even _if _she's alive she'll never look at you without seeing a killer."

"And what is it that you think she sees _now?_" His breath was cold, raking against Lennox's ear. "Every woman wants to be the one to change the bad boy, but there's a _limit_, don't you think? If Sydney couldn't love a killer, well… one more murder can't hurt. Between friends."

"You sick little shit," Lennox hissed. "You _like_ this."

"What creator doesn't enjoy his art?" Sark sneered.

Lennox let out (his skin felt _wet_ with his own blood, felt _wet_) a slow, wailing laugh. "You take _pride_ in your debasement – little Syd doesn't know _that_, does she? Doesn't know the latest love of her life considers himself a _painter_ with a dripping scalpel."

Lennox was trying to buy time. And part of him was just terrified by the indifference of his executioner.

Sark smiled, because he was about to win. "Who am I to quarrel with the choice of canvas? Bramante made do with a slab of stone."

That reference eluded Lennox; He had one remaining eye, a letter opener gauged through his hand, and he was never much a man of art anyway. "Byzantine?"

"High Renaissance. But you were within a hundred years, at least," Sark said encouragingly, and turned to the tray to select a new tool.

"So you fancy yourself Michaelangelo?" Lennox spat, grown hazy with the pain.

"I prefer the Venetians – Titian."

Sark kept his back to the prisoner, and Lennox could only envisage what kind of torture device he was about to be subjected to.

"A romantic, Sark? '_The Worship of Venus'_?"

Sark turned back around; in his hand he held a simple wood shaver – just a small flat blade with a metal base for slicing, an antiquated pencil sharpener.

"His later works. '_Marsyas_'," Sark answered. "'_The Flaying'_."

-

She made it through surgery and no further.

-

So this was what it felt like; _this_ was what spurred those words he'd constantly coaxed out of his own prisoners.

"_Please! Stop, stop – I'll tell you! Anything, anything, I'll tell you!_"

Sark halted long enough to slap duct tape over Lennox's mouth. (An artist works in silence.)

-

"Julian?" she asked.

Their surprise was well hidden, of course; at any rate, it was probably just the morphine talking. Jack took her hand and let out the breath he'd been holding since _the phonecall_ early that morning.

"Sydney. Sydney, I'm here," he whispered, and the tears kicked up in her eyes (predictable, like summer rain in the south, quick, fierce, then gone) at the sight of his familiar face.

A foreign feeling, familiarity. She'd lost her sense of balance in this sudden new life of hers.

"She made it. She's safe," Nadia cried to no one, grasping at the air with shaking hands.

Sydney's mouth was cotton cry and the ceiling stared down, merciless flourescence, when she tried to open her eyes. "…Dad?"

"I've got you," he said.

She could have drifted back to sleep; Let down her walls and surrendered to the welcoming haze. But there was work to be done, and heroes aren't allowed to sleep, are they?

"You were stabbed, Sydney. Sark… he took you. But you're safe now, sweetheart. I've got you," he repeated.

Exhaustion was crippling. That great invention morphine had stolen her consciousness and left her weak. "Not Sark," she answered.

"He was sending us a message," and new voice told her.

She knew the voice, and was revolted. Sydney threw her arms up and was stilled by the leather straps binding her to the hospital bed. ('_Nightmares_,' the doctor had said, '_Her thrashing could kill her._')

Nadia hastened to uncuff her sister's hands. With Herculean effort, Sydney opened her eyes.

"Sark bought his way out," Sloane elaborated. "He must have gotten to someone on the parole board. What better a statement then Sydney Bristow's corpse?"

"_Father,_" Nadia scolded, flinching.

"It's true enough," Jack spat, and then leaned in close to stroke Sydney's hair from her eyes. "The wound was bad, sweetheart. The blade caught your lung. You almost –"

"Get him out of here," she whispered.

Jack had been warned of phantoms. A wounded spy can come up with the most morbid of memories. "You were in surgery for almost seven hours. The doctors say it's a miracle."

Hooked to the monitor, the static green line of Sydney's pulse jumped.

"Get him _out!_" she barked, a hemorrage to her limited energy.

"_Who?_" Nadia gasped.

Sydney levelled her eyes at Sloane and snarled. "You _bastard_," she hissed. "You _sent_ him. Dad, it wasn't Julian – it wasn't Sark who stabbed me. It w –"

"Renzo Markovic," Sloane supplied. "Or, supposedly, James Lennox. You must believe me, Sydney, I had no idea."

"Sloane sent Lennox," Jack said, and pressed his palm to her chest, feeling her racing heartbeat. "He cleared it with me first. It was my fault."

"Dad, no. No, that's _not_ –"

"I'd never hurt you, Sydney," Sloane said. "You can't imagine the horror I felt when I found out it was Lennox who did this to you."

Nadia got hold of Sydney's other hand. "Sark must have gotten to him, too," she said.

"That's a _lie_," Sydney shouted, and her blood pressure jumped higher, 145 over 90. She dug her nails into Jack's forearm. "Sloane hired Lennox. _Sloane_ bought him."

"Why would he do that?" Nadia interrupted. "You trust _Sark_ over my father?"

"He lied to you, sweetheart," Jack said quietly. "Whatever Sark told you, it isn't true. It doesn't matter. You're safe now."

Sloane stepped forward. Sydney was powerless to move; he stroked her hair in a tender gesture. "I didn't do this, Sydney. I made a promise to my daughter," he said. "I promised Nadia I was a changed man."

150/95. The monitor chimed louder.

"Dad?" Sydney gasped. "Dad? You don't belive me?"

"I believe you've been lied to, Sydney," he said, soothing.

160 over 105. "She needs to rest. She needs to _stop this_," Nadia warned. "A few hours ago she almost _died_."

Sydney edged hysteria, and can you blame her? "Dad? _Dad?_ Tell me you believe me!"

"Sweetheart, you need to calm down," Jack insisted.

Sydney turned her eyes to Sloane, blackness blurring her vision. "Why, Sloane, tell me why? Why Sark? Why _me?_"

"Why are you doing this, Sydney?" Nadia asked her, cringing.

"Don't you believe a man can change his ways?" Sloane answered, and only Sydney heard the cruel mockery of it.

She felt that darkness sting again, and she wondered if maybe _that_ was the feeling ofa coldlocked cell Sark had run so desperately from.

180 over 115. "_Call the doctor!_" Jack shouted, jumping from his seat to grab his daughter by the shoulders.

Surgery is a tricky thing. Make it past the cutting table and the enemy's only half gone. Sydney's heart gave a staccato double beat and the blood burst through the fragile thread webbing stitched into her lacerated lung by a dozen doctors' hands. Her heart, beaten down by hours of overwork, went quiet.

"_She's coding!_" Jack howled, and frantically set up compressions against Sydney's chest.

Nadia's shrieks brought help. White scrubs and nimble hands and Jack was shoved to the side as they fought to restore his daughter's heartbeat.

"Sydney! Sydney, _please!_" he pleaded.

She had no air, she had no blood.

A minute passed, then three. Five. The only sounds in the room were of the ceaseless blank monitor.

"No," Jack said, as a simple clear statement.

"Time of death…" the doctor announced, glancing at his wristwatch.

Sydney opened her eyes. Deep gold brown, the exact shade of her mother's. Jack Bristow had loved those eyes, and then so had Julian Sark.

The monitor gave a small shivering beat.

"My god," the doctor said.

Sloane grabbed Nadia by the shoulders and wrenched her away from Sydney.

-

"That's all I know," Lennox rasped.

Sark nodded slowly; Lennox could only guess what went through that diseased mechanical mind.

"Thank you for your cooperation," Sark said, and rose to his feet, and left the man laying there.

"Where are you going?" Lennox gritted, unable to raise his voice for the hours of screaming, unable to lift his head for the pain.

"Get my girl," Sark replied distractedly, commonplace, like they were two aquiantances passing eachother in the hallway. He unlocked the rusted metal garagedoor and slid it upwards; the sunlight was blinding, but he'd never taken off those damned sunglasses.

"You're leaving me here?"

Sark smirked, pausing to glance over his shoulder. "I'm sure you'll find a knife somewhere to cut yourself lose."

Sark stepped outside and pulled the door shut. He locked it. To the casual observer he was a prosaic businessman checking on a shipping supply. The casual observer wouldn't check his nails for bloodstains.

(There's things that _sting_ and there's things that _fester_.Have you lost your balance yet? Play it again, Sam.)

He wavered on his feet a moment before falling to his knees on the harsh gravel drive.

Julian Sark had cried after his first murder, laughed after his second, and never gave it a thought since. Now he emptied his stomach against the wall of the rented storage garage and gasped for air that only suffocated him. His entire body shook; here were the old demons, back for more.

Sark had never professed to be anything holy. He'd heard screams as nursery rhymes and never held the illusion that blood ever washes free. Call him a hypocrit? You'd be astonished, the exceptions a man can make for his soul.

In his lifetime he'd filled a graveyard with his cruelty. But Sydney had still offered him a chance.

Sark told himself Lennox deserved what he got. And that forgiveness and belief were two unrelated things.

At any rate, there was work to be done.

-

**A/N : **Friedrich Nietzsche was a German philosopher in the (guessing?) 1860s. … '_Macbeth_' is pretty obvious… Confucius was a Chinese philosopher in the 500s BC. … Francois de la Rochefoucauld was a French Cardinal born in the 1640s. … Horace was a Roman poet in the time of Augustus. Which would be about 67 BC. I think. … George Santayana was a Spanish philosopher, sometime in the 1800s, sorry, don't know that one. … Dashiell Hammett absolutely rocks my socks, a writer in 1920s-30s who wrote _The Maltese Falcon_, _The Thin Man_, and _Red Harvest_, among others. _The Maltese Falcon_ was made into a movie starring Humphrey Bogart, who was also in _Casablanca_, two movies of the Film Noir genre that also contains _Sunset Boulevard_. ... The Byzantine era started in 1453, the High Renaissance in the early 1500s. ... Donato Bramante built the _Tempietto_ church in 1503 (I think?), Michaelangelo you probably know, and Titian is known best for the color and beauty of his work until he drastically changed his style to darker themes (supposedly after the death of his wife). ... Titian's painting '_The Flaying of Marsyas_' depicted the Greek myth of the satyr Marysas being flayed to death after losing a music contest with Apollo.

I think that's it. My dates might be totally pathetic, but I didn't feel like research. Some of you might not like my portrayal of Sark, but I tried _very_ hard to stay true to the character, and that means he's really truly not a damn bit heroic.


End file.
